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La Michoacana is a Mexican market, restaurant and bakery all in one

La Michoacana still serves classics, but now they've added a Mexican bakery.

Colorful piñatas hang from the ceiling of La Michoacana in the Spokane Valley. Chorizo, cheeses, beef and tripe fill a display case and several aisles are stocked with giant cans of jalapeño peppers, jars of pork rinds, seasonings, cans of mango juice, bags of tortillas and a whole aisle devoted to candy.

Garcia's father, Simon Garcia, opened La Michoacana Mini Market in Spokane Valley in 2001, a few years after he moved to Washington from Los Angeles. He started with just a small store, about half the size of what is there now.

"At that time, nobody had a Mexican grocery store here," says Simon.

A few years after opening, customers started coming in and asking for tortas, tacos and burritos. So the Garcias opened a kitchen and started a restaurant in the market.

The full menu features huevos ($5.95) in various forms, sopas ($7-$14.95), tacos ($1.50-$3), tortas ($4.95) and lunch specials such as camarones diabla ($12.95), which are prawns sautéed in butter and spicy red sauce.

You can sip on a Mexican beer, a Jarritos soda, horchata or a Mexican Coca-Cola, sweetened with cane sugar rather than the American version with high-fructose corn syrup.

If you're feeling particularly famished, try one of their enormous, plate-covering burritos — the kind you would only dare eat with a fork. The burritos come slathered in salsa, sprinkled with cheese, stuffed with rice, beans, lettuce, tomatoes and your choice from a lengthy meat list: adobada, birria, cabeza, carne asada, buche, carnitas, chorizo, lengua, pollo asado or tripa.

A little more than a month ago, La Michoacana added a bakery to their business: again, customers started asking for it, says Simon.

They hired a Salvadorian baker who makes a whole host of treats such as various kinds of flan, tres leches cakes, cream puffs, pastel de miel (honey cake) and cupcakes. (Orders can be placed a couple of days in advance for decorated cakes.) He also bakes Mexican sweet bread (75¢-$1) — which covers an entire wall of the market — including conchas, marranitos and orejas. ♦